Nobel Prize

“An intelligent man is sometimes forced to be drunk to spend time with his fools.”

– Ernest Hemingway

Ernest Hemingway was, as a friend of mine would say, some boy. Apart from winning the Nobel Prize for literature 1954, the American writer worked as an ambulance driver in Italy in World War I, covered the Spanish Civil War as a journalist and was even present with Allied troops during the Normandy Landings. He once said, “In order to write about life, first you must live it.” Good advice. But by that rationale, does living with the dog qualify me to write about him?

I am ashamed to admit that my experience of Hemingway’s writings is somewhat limited, which is to say, I have only ever read ‘The Old Man and the Sea’ and ‘A Farewell to Arms,’ with the former being much superior to the latter, although a rather lugubrious old tale for the most part.

The reason I mention Hemingway is because I read a short article last week about a story which is attributed to Hemingway but which is likely entirely erroneous – not that that bothered me one bit: Never let truth get in the way of a good story!

Anyway, the article went like this…

Back in the 1920s Hemingway was hanging out with some of his writing buddies, most likely battering at typewriters, smoking cigars and drinking mojitos when the man himself claimed that he could write a story with just six words. In fact, he wagered he could do just that and his writing buddies bet against him. Picking up a napkin and pen, Hemingway wrote…

For sale. Baby shoes. Never worn.

The writing buddies coughed up without complaint.

An extreme example of what you might call, flash fiction, the story in the form of a classified advert suggests a wider narrative possibly something involving infant death or maybe even miscarriage.

As I say, the baby shoes story is attributed to Hemingway although the link is unlikely. First, the claim of Hemingway’s authorship is based on an unsubstantiated anecdote and second, the story was only connected to the writer some 30 years after his death.

But as I also say, I don’t care. I like the idea of a curmudgeonly old man writing about baby shoes and a sense of loss. If Hemingway didn’t write that six-word masterpiece then what odds. Someone had to write it.

HOUND

As is often the case with life at home these days, as I finished the baby shoes/Hemingway article, I turned round to report my findings to the nearest person only to be confronted with the Hairy Fool, although in fairness to him, his ears pricked up as if I were about to say the most interesting thing ever uttered. There and then I decided that I would write a six-word story about Waffle.

To that end, I filled the kettle and set it to boil and hoked through the cupboard for some digestives. The first problem materialised right away: If I were to write a six word article about the Waff, how could I do it justice without the use of the vernacular?

“Just give it a rattle,” I said aloud as I munched my way through one digestive after another, schlurping the bit out with the tay.

The crux of the issue was: I needed to convey something, a story, an episode or an incident in much fewer words that I am normally accustomed to.

After I thought about things for another while (another cup or tea and this time a buttered digestive for max effect), I came to the conclusion that this wasn’t going to be as easy as I had previously imagined. Then I thought about it some more and then I thought about it some more.

Then I decided the tea wasn’t working and so decided to have a drink; maybe the liquor would grease the wheels of inspiration.

Then I thought about it some more and concluded that the genius element to Hemingway’s masterpiece was the opening gambit: ‘For sale.’

Not only did that perfectly set the scene but it also prepared the way for a great many eventualities. Could I ape the great man and start my own six word story with the premise of selling Waffle? In the end, I decided against it.

As with so many of my experiences with Waffle, the hound himself came to the rescue. The resulting episode went exactly like this.

Waffle barked. I shouted. The end.

Nobel Prize, here I come!